Withholding phone costs young Georgian $100K in Snapchat lawsuit
A young Georgia driver accused of causing an almost fatal crash while recording her speed on the Snapchat phone app has been fined more than $100,000 for failing to hand over her phone in an associated lawsuit.
A Spalding County judge said Christal Leatherwood, who was known as Christal McGee at the time of the crash, deliberately failed to preserve her phone for evidence in the case filed against her and Snap Inc. by the couple she rear-ended in September 2015.
Judge Josh Thacker said Leatherwood’s “unavailable” phone likely contains crucial evidence about whether she was using Snap’s now-scrapped “speed filter” when she crashed into Karen and Wentworth Maynard on Tara Boulevard in Clayton County.
The Maynards claim Snap is liable for making the filter that motivated drivers to be reckless, with sometimes fatal consequences. They allege Leatherwood was driving at least 91 mph when she hit them, leaving Wentworth Maynard with permanent brain damage.
Snap and Leatherwood deny the allegations, which are supported at least in part by testimony from the three passengers in Leatherwood’s car at the time of the incident.
Attorneys for Snap and Leatherwood did not immediately respond Monday to questions about the ruling.
Michael Neff, an attorney for the Maynards, said they still enjoy time with their children and grandchildren, though the wreck has forever changed their lives. Wentworth Maynard was in hospital and inpatient rehabilitation facilities for two months after the crash and has required care and supervision since, he said.
“He requires a walker or a wheelchair for mobility, and his thoughts, emotions and speech have also been severely impaired,” Neff told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
Leatherwood, 19 at the time of the crash, pleaded no contest to an associated criminal charge, court records show.
Under Thacker’s order Friday, Leatherwood must pay the Maynards $109,612 for the time they spent trying to get her phone. He said they first told Leatherwood she needed to preserve the device for evidence 19 days after the crash.
The judge said Leatherwood gave conflicting testimony about what she did with her phone, including that she used it for about eight months after the crash then handed it to her attorney, Anne Gower, in 2016.
Thacker said Leatherwood’s lawyer finally produced a phone in January 2024, claiming it was the one Leatherwood had with her at the time of the crash. But analysis by an expert revealed the phone belonged to Leatherwood’s sister and contained no data related to Leatherwood.
Thacker said he gave Leatherwood more time to search her home for the right phone, but none of the seven she claimed to have discovered were the one in question. He said the Maynards now must spend significant time and resources attempting to prove what could have been established by the phone that is missing.
The judge also said Snap might have a harder time proving its defense that Leatherwood was not using Snapchat at the time of the crash, though he noted the company “stands to benefit greatly from the information on the phone being lost.” Snap is the only party with data related to Leatherwood’s use of the app at the time of the incident, he said.
Thacker said Snap ultimately joined the Maynards in requesting Leatherwood be punished for spoiling evidence, and they shared some of the cost of examining the phone Leatherwood claimed to be hers.
The judge imposed an additional $28,581 sanction against Leatherwood, to be paid to Snap. He then reduced it to $0 because in 2016, Snap and Leatherwood jointly fought the Maynards’ attempt to inspect the phone, which was denied.
The case is set to be tried in June 2026.
Thacker said part of his sanction against Leatherwood will be telling the jury she deliberately failed to produce her phone, which may have contained evidence she was using Snapchat around the time of the crash.
He said Leatherwood’s insurer, ACCC Insurance, has filed for bankruptcy.
Snap is defending itself separately.
The judge said the three passengers in Leatherwood’s car at the time of the crash have contradicted her version of events, saying she was driving over 100 mph and using her phone.
Thacker said one of the passengers, Heather McCarty, testified that Leatherwood was using Snapchat at the crash scene. He said an “infamous” Snapchat image in the case shows an injured Leatherwood and the words “lucky to be alive.”
McCarty told reporters in 2016 that she asked Leatherwood to slow down after seeing through Leatherwood’s phone they were traveling as fast as 113 mph.
Lawyers for the Maynards said they look forward to showing jurors evidence that Snap knew its speed filter was tempting Snapchat users to drive fast. The company didn’t disable the filter until nearly six years after the Maynards were injured, Neff said.
In case filings, the couple claim Snap knew of 14 other vehicle crashes, some fatal, involving Snapchat or its speed filter. In April 2023, Snap confidentially settled a similar case filed in a federal court in California after three young men were killed in a 2017 crash in Wisconsin.
About the Author
Journalist Rosie Manins is a legal affairs reporter for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
